On the Border Between Worlds
by funk-tastic
Summary: A chance encounter, an old monk, a mistake, and two people Inuyasha thought he'd never see again. (Post-canon, inukag)


_(Hey everyone, it's been a while since I put out something new! This story is probably going to end up being only 3 chapters long or so, but it's been rattling around in my head for a while. Please let me know what you think... I'm always a huge fan of feedback._

 _ **Warning for major character death** \- but I promise this fanfiction will have a happy ending. Enjoy!)_

* * *

Inuyasha wasn't totally sure how exactly it had happened. One moment he was standing upright, life affixed as firmly as a well rooted oak tree, and then the next he'd blacked out.

He'd never seen the monk's blow coming. On any normal day he knew he would have felt the aura from a mile away, and likely would have avoided a confrontation if possible… but today he was out of sorts. The night of the new moon was coming and his senses were dulled down, like he was suffering a bad head cold. But on top of that, he was preoccupied.

Kagome was nine months pregnant. Or rather: she was eight months, three weeks and a few days pregnant. Any moment she'd go into labor and just like that, he'd be a father.

The prospect wasn't unpleasant, necessarily, just frightening. She was still relatively young and though she'd been back in the feudal age for nearly two years, she was still inexperienced. Kagome had tried to soothe both of their concerns _("I've delivered plenty of babies while I've been here. My body is made for this, how bad can it be?"_ ) but the reality of what could go wrong hung heavily over them both. He'd never heard of a half-demon fathering children. Granted, it was rare enough that half-demons lived long enough to reach fathering age, much less find someone willing to have children them. He wasn't even sure that he could get Kagome pregnant in the first place.

But ever the optimist, she was convinced that they should try it anyway. It hadn't even taken an entire month.

Perhaps it hadn't been the wisest choice, and he still had lingering doubts, but she was a beacon of love and acceptance. Even he knew that despite his own failings and insecurities, he would love any child borne by her – and he'd sooner pull out his own teeth than leave her to take care of everything all alone. So they'd taken the plunge, stumbling – or rather, hurtling at top speed – towards the child's birth.

Had Inuyasha not been so obsessively protective, or so concerned about her health, he probably wouldn't have gone out hunting that day. They already had plenty of food, but his justification had been that she needed good, fresh meat to restore her vitality before the baby came. That's what he'd been doing when he felt a wave of purifying aura bleed through his body, turning him numb.

Without the strength to stand, he had sunk to the ground, totally paralyzed as an old monk looked down at him. His face appeared pained and there was a scent of blood and decay all around him. Inuyasha noticed offhandedly that he looked haggard as well, very tired and poor, his robes threadbare and falling to pieces around him. He probably wasn't even especially powerful; he'd just caught the half-demon unaware.

"Evil creature, begone from this earth!"

Inuyasha would have fought, but he couldn't move. The moment he realized that this monk had no intention of letting him go, he felt a bolt of panic through him. He wasn't too proud to plead for his life, not anymore, not when he has so much to live for and so many people who depended on him. The only problem, however, was that he'd lost his voice completely, and now his vision was beginning to fade as well.

His last thoughts before darkness took him were that he wished he could have seen Kagome's face one more time.

o0o

There was an odd sensation around his body, like the feeling of floating downstream. It was gentle, comforting, but oddly cold; he thought he might have been dreaming if not for that coldness. Something tugged at the back of his brain that he had to open his eyes, that his situation was quite dire, but he ignored it. It felt good to rest. He was in no hurry to wake up.

But eventually the coldness sharpened into a chill, until it was unpleasant enough to make him stir. When he blinked his eyes, he was met with harsh, white light. It felt like staring directly at the sun.

He didn't know where he was. It wasn't the forest he'd been left in; he wondered if his body had been moved while unconscious. All senses flared into life, on high alert, waiting for any sign of danger. If he'd been moved, then he might have been captured, and in that case he could be facing torture, revenge, or enslavement. It felt like anything could happen, and so he sprung up on his feet, filled with energy that hadn't been there before. His eyes were wild, searching blindly in the mist for any trace of the monk - though he felt nothing at all, no aura, no nearby _yoki_ , not even regular signs of life like the chattering of little creatures or the rustling of grass. The hair on his arms stood on end.

"Inuyasha?"

He froze in place. The voice belonged to a woman, timid and soft… but familiar. He couldn't place it for the life of him, something about that high lilting sound reminding him of comfort and of pain all at once. He turned his head partway, only the barest sign that he had heard her. His heart ached inexplicably.

"No," she said, softly. "It can't be you."

Now he turned fully, posturing himself defensively, ready for a trick or an attack or some sort of illusion. He had to force his eyes to focus past all the harsh, unnatural light, but when he did they landed on two figures that were shrouded and hazy in the mist.

"Oh, no," she whimpered, her shadowy hands coming to her mouth to stifle a sob. Inuyasha blinked, trying to make her form clear, but it helped very little. All he could see was that she was a petite woman, with someone much larger hovering behind her almost protectively.

"Who are you?" he asked, tense, but trying not to give away his anxiety.

"Can't you see me?" she replied, shifting a little closer. It looked like she was materializing, bit by bit, turning solid from thin air. First, two dainty feet turn into flesh, then silk robes formed around her, and then a cascade of black hair gleamed and tumbled over slim shoulders and down her back. Last of all was her face, hauntingly familiar.

Her eyes were the same sparkling black he'd remembered as a child, her mouth still painted into an aristocratic pout. Her skin was paler than it had been in life, but everything else was definitely the same.

"Mother?"

"My gods," she wept, picking up her skirts and coming to him in a flurry of motion. "Tell me this isn't really you-"

"Are you real?" he said abruptly, jarring her and making her pause before she flung her arms around him. His voice had come out icier than he had intended, but he remembered Sesshomaru's trick with the mu'onna too well to feel at ease with her yet. "I'm not going to be fooled again, I know you're dead."

She frowned, obviously upset by this, but folded her hands together instead of reaching for him. "I'm very real, although I can't say I don't understand. That was a horrible thing, what your brother did."

"How do you even know about that? If you were real, there's no way you could-"

"Do you think the dead don't see?" she interjected, still quietly. "I've seen everything. I saw every moment you've spent alone, and every day you've spent fighting. I know about the miko… well, both of them. I know you have a wife."

"I-"

"You shouldn't be here," she went on, hurriedly.

It sort of clicked in his head all at once, a staggering realization but one that seemed obvious in hindsight.

"Wait… am I dead?"

His mother bit her lip, eyes filling with tears.

"I'm dead."

"You're too young," she said, bitterly. "After everything we did to keep you alive, after all the fighting you had to do…"

She seemed more distraught about it than he was. All he felt was a kind of detachment, more of the coldness from before.

"This is wrong. There's been a mistake," she told him, growing more and more impassioned. "You need to go back."

"You don't get to make that decision, dearest," another voice said from the haze. "If he's dead then there's likely nothing we can do about it."

His mother whirled, her eyes filled with anger. Inuyasha couldn't remember her ever being so livid or this outwardly emotional in his lifetime.

"Says the man who made a sword to cheat death! Even you must know that this isn't fair," she pleaded, then the figure came closer to them both.

"I didn't say it was fair," he sighed, and Inuyasha watched him settle into a physical, solid state.

He'd only seen his father once, and even then it had just been an apparition. After sealing So'unga, he'd decided to show up long enough to give a few words and then disappear again – to say Inuyasha had been annoyed was an understatement. For years he'd heard about his great and terrible father, had lived in the shadow of his older brother and had failed over and over to meet the expectations of a full-blood yokai. His father had left more questions in his wake than answers, one trial after another, as though he were trying to trick his sons into behaving rather than just making his wishes clear. Inuyasha couldn't understand the man's motivations, or his decisions; what was worse, Sesshomaru didn't seem to understand either, and had always taken out his frustrations on his half-brother. Even now, while his life was – or had been - so much better than before, there was a lingering thread of resentment. All he knew for sure was that this man had caused his mother a great deal of suffering before she'd died, and that he'd been stupid enough to father a half-demon.

Inuyasha immediately averted his gaze, turning it back to his mother in a supreme show of irritation. If his father was bothered by this, then he didn't show it.

"There must be a way to put you back," she said, gentler. "I won't accept it."

"You're being stubborn, Izayoi, you know that's not how it works," his father sighed. Inuyasha immediately felt his hackles go up – nobody was allowed to chastise his mother, especially not in front of him. He clenched his hands into fists and continued to avoid looking over at him even as he spoke.

"If she thinks there's a way to do it, I'm willing to try," he retorted. "I'd rather find out I'm wrong than give up from the start."

Izayoi cracked a smile, her eyes still dewy. It was enough to placate her, but Inuyasha hated to admit that his father was probably right. There was no guarantee that he could go back, even if Sesshomaru used Tenseiga (which was a stretch all on its own). First they'd have to realize he was missing, track down his ever wandering older brother, and find his body before convincing the bastard to bring him back. By then it might already be too late; especially if he was already in the realm of the dead. There was no way in heaven or hell Sesshomaru could be counted on to go to such lengths to save someone he'd spent years trying to kill.

He heaved a huge sigh, a hand coming up to his temple. Thinking about it at length made his head hurt, and he was still grappling with reality. He was dead. He was _dead_.

Unbidden, a hundred different memories filled his brain. He thought of his friends, of Sango and Miroku and their little family and everything they had already done for him while he had been lonely, all the love and support they'd given him without a second thought. He wondered how Shippo might take the news; though he'd always fought with Inuyasha, it was as clear as day that they were a family of their own right. Of course, he thought about Kagome at length, of her heart shaped face and brilliant smile, how breathtakingly beautiful she'd been the day they'd finally married. He thought of every fight, every kiss, every night spent together, how she'd grown and grown with his child, how much she'd learned from Kaede in so little time. She was so brave and beautiful and incredibly intelligent. Of everyone left behind, she would feel his loss the most keenly.

All the resistance he'd built up to his current situation crumpled in an instant. The numb sensation was sucked out of him and replaced with hot, fresh grief – he had been careless for even a moment, and he'd been killed. For a few blissful years he'd found acceptance and love in that little village, and he'd lowered his guard only a fraction. The world still hated half breeds, and this time he was reminded in the most brutal fashion imaginable. He sucked in a breath, trying to fight the prickling in his ribs and the stinging in his eyes.

Like she always had before, his mother knew what it meant. She opened her arms wide, her face tender and inviting. For the first time in many, many years, he hugged her. And it was really her, not a trick or an illusion but his real mother. He was too tall now to lay his head on her chest like he had as a child, so he settled for nestling his face in her neck. It took a few moments before he allowed himself to cry, and even then it was silent and choking.

"I know," she whispered into his hair, stroking the top of his head lovingly. "It's okay, I know."

He was going to feel embarrassed when he was done, he was sure of it, but for just a little while he supposed it was fair to rely on her. He had died, after all. She held him right through it, falling right back into the comforting role he remembered of her, as though it had only been days and not years since they'd seen each other last.

o0o

Kagome was worried.

Inuyasha had left around noon to hunt down something for dinner, but by sunset there was still no sign of him. At first she thought little of it; he could take care of himself and there were few things that could pose any real danger to him. As the sky darkened, however, she started to wonder if he'd run into trouble. She convinced herself to wait it out until morning, that he would definitely have returned by then and she'd wake up to find him home safely. She lay awake in fits, unable to get comfortable while the baby squirmed around inside of her like it could feel her anxiety.

"Papa will be fine, I'm sure," she cooed to her belly, but it was really more for her own benefit.

After she did fall asleep, she found herself waking up again at the slightest provocation. Any noise could be her husband, although realistically she was sure that if he returned he'd be too quiet to wake her. It was, in short, a miserable night.

In the morning she set about her usual chores; cooking breakfast, washing the dishes, folding away the bedding. She had a long day ahead of her – it was early in the growing season, and her herb garden needed constant tending. Even now she never slowed down, the world not stopping for her just because she was pregnant. So she set to work and hoped that it would take her mind off of her missing spouse.

Around noon, Sango came by to see if she needed help (a habit she'd taken up lately, since she knew how hard the last month could get), and without any warning Kagome felt tears spring to her eyes. She dropped the hoe in her hand and sank to the dirt.

"It's Inuyasha," she explained, when her friend ran over to her. "I think I'm working myself up, but he's been gone since yesterday and I haven't seen or heard anything from him."

"Did he say where he was going?"

"Hunting," she choked, trying not to weep openly and make a fool of herself. "He kept going on about how I needed to keep my strength up, and then he said he was going out to find something to eat!"

"That doesn't sound right," Sango murmured, her brows creasing. "He shouldn't be taking this long."

"No!" Kagome replied, her throat closing up. "What if… what if something has happened to him?"

Sango looked contemplative. "He's one of the strongest people I've ever met, so there's probably not much out there that could harm him seriously, but… if he hasn't returned by tomorrow morning, I'll get a search party together."

Kagome nodded, not trusting her own voice to stay steady.

"I'm guessing you don't want to stay alone," Sango said quietly, and Kagome nodded even more fiercely. "I'll tell Miroku what's going on. I'm sure he wouldn't mind having an extra guest tonight, and I know the girls would love to see you."

"Oh, Sango…"

"It's alright! I know how you must be feeling right now," she said, blushing and looking down at her hands. "It's hard enough to be expecting, but it's just so much worse if you feel like you're alone."

Kagome shifted and put her arms around the other woman's shoulders, awkwardly leaning to avoid crushing her large belly. Sango rubbed long, comforting strokes along her back.

She'd try to stay optimistic until tomorrow morning, and keep busy in the meantime so that she didn't have time to dwell on things too much. And it did help, ultimately – after a long day of tending to farmers' work wounds, aches and pains, soothing sick children and other expectant mothers, Kagome was almost too tired to think before bed. The twins had crawled into her sleeping mat with her, excited to have their auntie with them for the evening, and after a little kicking and a lot of giggling they finally fell asleep. She watched their chubby, sweet faces and rosebud lips as they slept, trying to focus on feeling positive and excited for her own child's birth. It did a little bit of good.

Still, she couldn't shake the sensation of wrongness that had settled into her bones.

o0o

Inuyasha hadn't moved from one spot for almost an hour.

He sat at the edge of what looked like a riverbank, staring at the smooth, glassy surface of the water until he felt like his brain had left his body entirely. He guessed that in plenty of ways, that was exactly what it _had_ done, but the feeling was still surreal. The reflection of the not-sky was pinkish and bright in the pool in front of him, which should have been utterly beautiful but was instead repulsive to him. He'd moved directly from denial to anger.

Behind him he could hear his parents speaking in low tones, not quite arguing but still clearly on edge.

"He has a wife and a child on the way," his mother said, her voice laced through with sorrow. "It would be horrific to expect that poor young woman to raise their child alone."

"She could do it, she's a strong girl," his father replied. "But you're right. It's just that I can't imagine how we could put him back."

"There has to be something!"

"Izayoi, you can't undo death without a price. Even Tenseiga had a limit."

"But we aren't getting anything accomplished by just sitting here! It's as good as accepting defeat, and I'm not going to do that!"

"Where would you go? What are you even expecting to find? If we wander from here, what do you think we'll see beside more spirits of the dead and maybe an odd god or two?"

"If we find a god, we could negotiate-"

"Izayoi-"

"I'm with her," Inuyasha cut in, snapping out of his fog immediately and turning his head to look at them. They stopped abruptly, eyes fixed on him and their sentences dying mid word. "I don't care if it's against the laws of nature, or whatever. I'm going back. Kagome isn't raising that baby on her own."

Izayoi clasped her hands together, determination written all over her face. "She won't have to."

The Inu no Taisho folded his arms, but it wasn't petulant – he seemed more resigned than anything else. Inuyasha suddenly wondered if his mother had always been this stubborn, and if his father was already used to it.

"What are you looking at me for, _oyaji_ ," Inuyasha said roughly. "Do you want me to stay dead or something?"

"Not even remotely," his father replied, totally unphased and not rising to take Inuyasha's baiting words. "It would be nice if we had a plan before we go out into the unknown. Especially if we want to negotiate with gods, the fickle bunch. One wrong move could have us banished to worst corners of Hell imaginable."

Inuyasha went quiet, again realizing that his father was right. He'd be damned if he let him know that, though.

"You and your plans," Izayoi sighed gustily. "I never understood most of them, anyway. We're wasting time here, and we won't even know where to begin forming a plan unless we know what we're working with."

The Inu no Taisho looked down at his wife, and Inuyasha expected him to find a counterpoint – but to his immense surprise, he conceded instead.

"Of course we'll go. There're no guarantees, though."

"There never are, dearest," Izayoi said, her lips turning slightly. She seemed happy to have convinced him, but Inuyasha thought that there was something else going on here that he was missing. He couldn't place it - but it felt like they were speaking a secret language, that more was being said than he could understand.

"The direction most likely to yield results is… off towards the valley where the sun rises," his father explained, looking to the horizon. Inuyasha followed his line of sight, but all he could see was more mist and fog – there were no defining features of this place besides the same harsh light for kilometers on end. He wasn't even sure the sun existed in this world.

"Hm, that sounds like a good place to start," Izayoi replied, tapping her lips with a slender finger. "Lead the way."

His father nodded, and then he looked back and threw Inuyasha a look that clearly said _follow us_.

With no other reason to argue, he picked himself up off the ground and followed his parents into the unknown.

o0o

The sun rose and dawn came, and Higurashi Kagome rose with it.

For a moment she forgot where she was, disoriented by her strange surroundings, but she laid very still until it sank in. On either side of her was a small, warm body, two snoring children whose little fingers were curled up in her sleeping yukata. Off in the direction of her head Sango and Miroku were just waking up, trying to stir without waking the toddler sandwiched between them. She felt herself smile for a moment, at peace, until she remembered why she was here.

Inuyasha still hadn't returned.

Trying not to fly out of bed and race home, she paced herself through the process of waking and dressing and preparing for the day. Her face was a careful mask of peacefulness and calm as she helped Sango prepare the morning meal. Halfway through their soup and rice, she was internally in utter shambles.

"You can go," Miroku said, not at all unkindly. He looked worried too, tapping his fingers nervously against his wooden bowl. "If he's still not back, we'll start searching today."

"Thank you," she breathed, bowing her head at her friends and trying not to trip in her hurry to get outside. The brightness of the sun and the air felt almost blinding, leaving her dizzy. She raced down the well-worn pathway home, praying for a sign–

All she found when she came home was emptiness. There had been no sign that anyone had come back at any point; the floor was undisturbed, everything exactly where she'd left it. Kagome tried to rationalize it to herself, that of course if he'd returned to find her gone he would have come to find her. It didn't help at all, and she clutched at the doorframe to keep from collapsing in another fit of tears.

She felt around in the air, trying to breathe and think clearly – she tried to get a hint of his _yoki_ anywhere nearby. There was nothing, just the faint threads of his trail into the forest, but otherwise a dead trail. It was time for extraordinary measures.

After putting together some sense of composure, she returned to Sango and Miroku's home, ready to give them the news. What she found instead was a small gathering growing towards the center of the village, people starting to crowd around an unseen source. She ran over and found Kaede near the middle of it, trying to keep everyone settled.

"Kaede-ba-chan!"

"Kagome," the old woman called back, waving for Kagome to come closer. "We have a visitor who might be in need of your help."

Pushing her way through the ring of bodies, she now saw that the village leader, was holding up an old monk by his arms.

The man looked in a pitiful state, his clothing tattered and bloodstained, his eyelids drooping heavily over weary eyes. His breath was shallow and even a little rattling in his chest – Kagome knew that he needed help sooner rather than later, and moving him further would likely only complicate his condition.

"Lay him down, Rikichi, and be as gentle as you can!"

He nodded, laying the monk down carefully and removing his haori to form a makeshift pillow so his head would stay elevated. Kagome knelt (with some difficulty) next to the man, looking him over for signs of brain damage or internal injury. She pulled his eyelids open, noticing that he was struggling to follow her movements.

"I think he's concussed," she mumbled, and then she leaned in closer. "Can you hear me? Do you have a name?"

"I can," he responded weakly. "My name is Koshiro. Where am I?"

"You're in a village, you'll be quite safe here," she said calmly, all her previous anxiety having been taken over by her automatic bedside behavior. "My name is Kagome, and I'm a miko here. We're all going to do whatever we can to make sure you get better."

"A pregnant miko?" he replied, sort of disbelieving. "I've never heard of anything like it."

"The world is very big, Koshiro-san, I'm sure there are many things you've never heard of," she told him, but not in a chastising way. "I promise it doesn't impact my abilities at all."

Koshiro hummed under his breath, but he seemed to be coming in and out of consciousness.

"You have to stay awake, Koshiro-san," Kagome said firmly. "Why don't you tell me what happened to you?"

"Oh, uh," he tried, taking a few moments to focus on her face. He smiled a large, partially toothless smile at her, the thin skin around his eyes crinkling pleasantly. "You're very beautiful, has anyone told you that?"

"Thank you, but that's not an answer. Please try to remember how you got here."

"Well… it was… there were demons in the village," he said, his brow now furrowed as he focused. "Yes, I'd lived there for years without trouble. I think they were hungry? Nobody knew how to fight them."

"And then what?"

"I'm the… only one with any spiritual powers. I'm getting on in years, I'm afraid, I couldn't do much," he went on, starting to become visibly upset. "I don't know where they came from. They looked like mukade, or maybe they were spiders? The village was… destroyed. Nobody left, that I know of."

"I'm very sorry, Koshiro-san," Kagome said gently, lowering her head. "We'll pray for their repose."

"That's kind of you," he continued, flexing his fingers where they lay on his chest. "I wandered through the forest here until I found this village. But there was… trouble there too. Did you know that you had a hanyo lurking nearby?"

Kagome's heart stopped dead in her chest, then painfully lurched back into motion at double speed. Her eyes snapped to his, trying to stay calm, trying not to give him any reason to worry or make his condition worse.

"Did you… did you see a hanyo in the forest, Koshiro-san?"

"Oh, yes. Don't worry though, I took care of him. Shouldn't be bothering you."

All around them, there was a collective gasp. Kagome felt her hands shaking like leaves, her throat closing up, her head screaming _no, no, no!_

"I'm sorry to keep asking questions, but can you tell me what you mean by 'took care of him'?" she asked, her voice losing its calm and quiet quality very, very quickly.

"I think I killed him."

Kagome took in a breath, resisting the urge to faint or scream, but the world felt as though it had fallen apart all around her. Kaede had come closer, putting her hands on Kagome's shoulders without her even realizing it.

"Come on, I think he's told us everything," the old miko said, her voice rough but almost motherly. "Rikichi, take him to the shrine and make him comfortable. Keep an eye on him, and make sure he doesn't try to get up and leave. We're going to need to ask him more questions later."

"Yes, Kaede-sama," he said sharply, but his eye caught Kagome's and his face became sympathetic. Kagome could feel a cloud of pity from the villagers all around her, suffocating her, choking the air out from her lungs.

"Kaede," she said weakly, leaning and swaying on her knees until she fell into the older woman's grasp completely. Her fears had been confirmed; the worst had happened, and now all that was left to do was to find his body. She didn't know what they might see when they did, what she might be faced with - without warning her mind supplied her with something gruesome and terrifying, and she bit back another scream.

There was nothing they could do until the monk was in a better condition anyway – and so Kagome decided she would throw herself into his care, so that they could find Inuyasha as soon as possible.

"I'll look after him," Kagome told Kaede, firm and determined even though her cheeks were now covered with tear tracks.

"I understand," Kaede replied, nodding. "But I know that look in your eye. Even if I had told you to go home and rest, you wouldn't have done it."

"I won't rest," she said, and the unsaid words hung in the air: _I won't rest until we bring him home._


End file.
